Saturday, 21 June 2014

Thursday night saw the album launch of Matty B's Philosophical Bogan, a stand up show of hilarious comedy coming from the renowned Matty B.

The Friend in Hand, Glebe, was the perfect setting for a comedy set. I don't often frequent the pub, so I wasn't really aware of the Thursday routine that is A Mic In Hand- an opportunity for amateur stand up comedians to showcase their work. The Friend In Hand hotel is a quirky, offbeat pub steeped in old timey Australiana. It has the full regalia, such as mannequins in wet suits, a wall of car registration plates and complete with George, the resident Cockatoo. The Friend in Hand is a place of unique character, warmth and has an inherent sense of Australian dry, sarcastic humour anyway- so it only makes sense for the hotel to boast a live comedy night.

The line up of comedians were great. For an amateur presentation, the presenters gave all they had- some presenting successful one-liners bam, one after the other, others from an international stage with reflections on travel and Australia. The most memorable comedians managed to dish out representations of modern society with uncanny accuracy and hilarious logic. These esoteric outlooks on life left the audience massaging their cheeks from laughing too hard.

The headline act, Matty B, served his unique perspectives on life with the side dishes of dry, black humour and fragmented existentialism. His act was aptly named Philosophical Bogan and I highly recommend his act to anyone interested in stand up comedy. His humour is based in reality with real life experiences as he astutely draws attention to their inherent flaws and mocks them with dry comic timing. At other times, his experiences are so unique and esoteric that you can't help but laugh at the level of ridiculity and outrageousness in each situation.

Tuesday, 17 June 2014

I was born in 1979, and primarily my introduction to comedy came through cassette tape recordings that Dad would play in the car. I was given no visual, just a stream of consciousness that came from one lone voice on a stage, with the only other stimuli being the sounds of audience reactions. For years, I didn't even know what people like Rodney Rude or George Smilovici looked like, I just knew their rants, their jokes and their potty mouths.

There’s something special about listening to comedy when you haven’t already come to a conclusion about the performer based on their appearance, mannerisms or the type of setting you’re about to watch them in. It’s kind of like seeing a movie when you haven’t seen the trailer - you haven’t already formed an opinion against which you’re going to measure the experience.

That’s a long-winded way of saying; I like listening to audio comedy. Also, the accessibility of it means that more and more comics, from no names to big names are recording albums and podcasts, and finding a voice online.

I just had the pleasure of listening to a guaranteed future big name, Matty B, in his debut album, ‘Philosophical Bogan’.

Now, I’ll confess at this point, I know Matty, as I am a fellow comic, but in sitting down to listen to this album, I tried to approach it as though I was that young kid again, listening to George Smilovici or another cassette or record of the day, hearing the jokes of a stranger for the first time without being distracted by visuals.

One thing is astoundingly clear, when you are consuming comedy like this, your focus is on the strength of material and how well it can transcend the limitation of being communicated to only one of your senses. And listening to the album confirmed one thing that I had already strongly expected, Matty B is one of the best joke writers in the country, and by the sounds of it, this relative newcomer is only just getting started.

Recorded at The Oriental Hotel in Newcastle, where Matty grew up, and has an unmistakable fondness for, ‘Philosophical Bogan’ gives us insight into Matty’s creative mind and his unique takes on; Newcastle, drug use, drinking, his dad, bogans, Aldi, getting a coffee, shouting from cars, and fence security, just to name a handful of topics.